Exploration

'Choosing Civility' author to give free public lecture

Forni on campus as part of Lynn’s Dialogues of Learning Speaker Series

Published Mar. 02, 2010

P.M. Forni, an award-winning professor at Johns Hopkins
University, is an expert on civility. Author of Choosing Civility: The Twenty-Five Rules of Considerate Conduct,
Forni will: give a lecture on March 16 at 9:30 a.m. in the Amarnick-Goldstein
Concert Hall on Lynn’s campus.

Later that afternoon, at 4 p.m., Forni will serve on a panel
along with Lynn students and professors to discuss civility and conflict in
Nilo Cruz’ Pulitzer Prize winning play: Anna
and the Tropics. The panel discussion will be held in the de Hoernle
Lecture Hall in the Green Center on campus. Both the lecture and panel
discussion are free and open to the public.

Forni
will speak to the campus community as part of Lynn’s Dialogues of Learning
Speaker Series, a series designed to encourage dialogue among students and
staff as is designated in Lynn’s core curriculum. “Choosing Civility: The Twenty-Five Rules of Considerate Conduct was
chosen as required reading material in the Dialogues of Learning for all first-year
students,“ said Cynthia Patterson, Vice President for Academic
Affairs.

As its’ title suggests, Forni’s book outlines 25
things people can do everyday to make daily interactions more pleasant. “As a
university community, civility is essential to learning and to all forms of
scholarly inquiry and freedom of thought and expression,” said Patterson. “It
is always worthwhile to renew our commitment to our values as a civil
community.”

Forni will conduct
daylong sessions on the topic of civility for the Lynn community on campus:

*4 p.m. – Forni
will serve on a panel along with
Lynn students and professors to discuss civility and conflict in Nilo Cruz’ Pulitzer
Prize winning play: Anna and the Tropics
in the de Hoernle Lecture Hall in the Green Center

*These events are free and open to the public

An award-winning civility and Italian literature professor
at Johns Hopkins University, where he has taught for the past 20 years, Forni recommends
people to: think twice before asking favors, give constructive criticism,
refrain from idle complaints, respect others’ opinions, don't shift
responsibility and blame, among other things. He also offers practical ways to
put these everyday gestures into practice.

In 1997, Forni
co-founded the Johns Hopkins Civility Project to assess the significance of
civility, manners and politeness in contemporary society. Over the years, he
has continued to illustrate the connections among civility, ethics and quality
of life.